|
Heart of Asia Conference
|
- Heart of Asia – Istanbul Process is a platform to discuss regional issues concerning Afghanistan and its neighbors. The broad areas of focus are the following ie, Counterterrorism, development, poverty, and drug trafficking.
- Members include the regional neighbors of Afghanistan including India. The conference also has 17 other supporting countries including Western countries like the USA, and the UK. It also has supporting organizations like the United Nations for its activities.
|
|
Raisina Dialogue
|
- Raisina Dialogue a conference initiated by India. It aims at improving the relations between India’s neighbors in the Asian region. It is modeled based on the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore.
- The theme of the first conference was “Connecting Asia“. It aims at Asian integration and improving Asian integration with the world.
|
|
Mekong Ganga Cooperation (MGC)
|
- It comprises six member countries, namely India, Thailand, Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam.
- The organization takes its name from the Ganga and Mekong, the two large rivers in the region, and thus aims to build relations in the countries through which both these rivers flow.
- To develop future trade and investment opportunities in the region, they emphasize four areas of cooperation, which are tourism, Culture, Education, and Transportation.
|
|
BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multisectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation)
|
- BIMSTEC comprises of Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Bhutan, and Nepal.
- Its regional spread is among South Asian and Southeast Asian countries. They aim to improve technological and economic cooperation.
- The grouping has identified 14 priority areas, some of which are Transport and communication, Tourism, Environment, Disaster management, Counterterrorism, and Transnational Crime.
|
|
SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation)
|
- SAARC is a grouping of countries in the South Asian region to promote regional unity and economic cooperation.
- Its member countries include Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Nepal, Maldives, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka.
|
|
IBSA (India Brazil South Africa) Dialogue Forum
|
- IBSA is a trilateral grouping that represents multicultural democracies among these three countries that are spread over three continents.
- It aims at promoting South-South cooperation. The summits take place regularly every year and the broad focus areas are Agriculture, Trade, Energy, Transport, Science and Technology, and Education.
|
|
Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO)
|
- SCO is a Eurasian (Europe+Asia) organization comprising of China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. India and Pakistan were also accepted as full members recently.
- Becoming a member of SCO is a diplomatic victory for India as it aspires to become a global power.
- The International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) can get a boost. INSTC aims at connecting India, Russia, Iran, Europe, and Central Asia.
- The construction of the TAPI gas pipeline will also get a revival as the works are stalled for a long time.
- Central Asia and Russia are rich in oil, natural gas, coal, and other minerals like Uranium. The import of such natural resources can become easier by joining SCO.
- The development of Chabahar Port for access through Iran can become a nodal point for accessing the land-locked Central Asian countries.
|
|
BRICS
|
- The BRICS summit was the annual BRICS summit, an international relations conference attended by the heads of state or heads of government of the five member states Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa.
- Now that NAM (Non-alignment) is almost defunct and very little wealth is left in the Commonwealth, BRICS provides a great alternative for India to build its global profile.
- India has tried to use BRICS as a forum to engage China as the latter has become the largest market for the fast-industrializing countries of East Asia. India wants to resolve the age-old mistrust and complicated relationship between the two countries since the 1962 war between them.
- The New Development Bank (NDB), formerly the BRICS Development Bank, is a multilateral development bank operated by the BRICS states.
- The bank’s primary focus of lending will be infrastructure projects with authorized lending of up to $34 billion annually.
|